To be clear the trial for THAT shooting ended in mistrial.
Here is more courtesy of the New York Times:
The trial of Michael T. Slager, the North Charleston police officer whose videotaped killing of an unarmed black man staggered the nation as it was embroiled in debate about police misconduct and racial biases in law enforcement, ended in a mistrial on Monday.
Judge Clifton B. Newman’s decision to halt the proceedings came three days after jurors signaled that they were within one vote of returning a guilty verdict against Mr. Slager, who could have been convicted of either murder or voluntary manslaughter for the killing of Walter L. Scott. But jurors also sent conflicting messages on Friday about whether they could break their impasse, setting off a confused legal frenzy.
On Monday, though, the panel of 11 white people and a black man again sent word that it would not be able to reach a unanimous verdict about Mr. Slager’s conduct, prompting the mistrial ruling.
So hard for a jury to know the right decision in a case like this.
If only there were some video tape that clearly showed the suspect running away when he was shot.
Oh wait......
And as NYT points out there is nothing new about this outcome:
The outcome in the Slager case is similar to the resolutions in other recent trials involving claims of police misconduct. This fall, a jury in Cincinnati deadlocked in the case of a university police officer who fatally shot a motorist who was black and unarmed. Here in South Carolina, juries twice deadlocked when considering charges against a rural police chief who fatally shot an unarmed black man. And in December 2015, the trial of a Baltimore police officer charged in the death of Freddie Gray ended in a mistrial. (After a judge, ruling in bench trials, cleared other Baltimore officers, the prosecutor there dropped all of the criminal cases in the matter of Mr. Gray’s death.)
And people wonder why groups like BLM exist, and why they spend their time protesting in the streets.
Source http://ift.tt/2hcl2Zg
Here is more courtesy of the New York Times:
The trial of Michael T. Slager, the North Charleston police officer whose videotaped killing of an unarmed black man staggered the nation as it was embroiled in debate about police misconduct and racial biases in law enforcement, ended in a mistrial on Monday.
Judge Clifton B. Newman’s decision to halt the proceedings came three days after jurors signaled that they were within one vote of returning a guilty verdict against Mr. Slager, who could have been convicted of either murder or voluntary manslaughter for the killing of Walter L. Scott. But jurors also sent conflicting messages on Friday about whether they could break their impasse, setting off a confused legal frenzy.
On Monday, though, the panel of 11 white people and a black man again sent word that it would not be able to reach a unanimous verdict about Mr. Slager’s conduct, prompting the mistrial ruling.
So hard for a jury to know the right decision in a case like this.
If only there were some video tape that clearly showed the suspect running away when he was shot.
Oh wait......
And as NYT points out there is nothing new about this outcome:
The outcome in the Slager case is similar to the resolutions in other recent trials involving claims of police misconduct. This fall, a jury in Cincinnati deadlocked in the case of a university police officer who fatally shot a motorist who was black and unarmed. Here in South Carolina, juries twice deadlocked when considering charges against a rural police chief who fatally shot an unarmed black man. And in December 2015, the trial of a Baltimore police officer charged in the death of Freddie Gray ended in a mistrial. (After a judge, ruling in bench trials, cleared other Baltimore officers, the prosecutor there dropped all of the criminal cases in the matter of Mr. Gray’s death.)
And people wonder why groups like BLM exist, and why they spend their time protesting in the streets.
Source http://ift.tt/2hcl2Zg
